Prejudice Is A Terrible Sin!

Nat King Cole (an American singer and musician) became a successful recording artist and was the first African-American to host his own national television program. In 1948, he purchased a beautiful home in an exclusive Los Angeles neighborhood. When the local neighborhood association confronted him and informed him it didn't want any undesirables to move in. Cole responded, "Neither do I. If I see any coming in here, I'll be the first to complain." He lived in that house until his death in 1965.

Changing your belief system and view of the world as you have been taught is a dramatic challenge for most. For some it is an impossible barrier to cross. Many would rather fight than switch their belief system.

From time to time, it’s good to ask our Lord Jesus to search your heart to see if there is any sin of prejudice there. If it is, then we need to be willing to have him who is our life dissolve the prejudice---he is the only one who can do it---so that we can continue to enjoy the "unity of the Spirit" at this Christian fellowship and with other Christians around this community and the world.

Dr. John Perkins, African-American pastor and urban leader, tells how with much pain he overcame his prejudices against whites. I’m quoting what he said at his court trial on February 7, 1970. “When I got to jail and saw the people in jail, of course I was horrified as to why we were arrested. And when I got in the jail Sheriff Jonathan Edwards came over to me right away and said, “This is the smart nigger, and this is a new ballgame.You’re not in Simpson country now; you are in Brandon. He began to beat me; and from that time on they continued beating me.”

He later was released from jail, but in July of that same year had a heart attack. In the hospital he had a lot of time to think. He thought about blacks and whites. He thought about how, in a country that claimed to stand for “liberty and justice for all,” a black man in Mississippi could get no justice. He thought about how in Mississippi ‘Christians’ were the most racist whites of all.

He said the Spirit of God worked on him and the image of the cross of Christ formed in his mind. Jesus understood his suffering. John Perkins read Matthew 6:14-15, “For if you forgive men for their transgressions, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But, if you do not forgive men, then your heavenly Father will not forgive your transgressions.”

He said to receive God’s forgiveness, “I was going to have to forgive those who had hurt me. As I prayed, the faces of those policemen passed before me one by one and I forgave each one. Faces of other white people from the past came before me, and I forgave them, I could sense that God was working a deep inner healing in me that went back beyond February 7, 1970. It went clear back to my earliest memories of childhood. God was healing all those wounds that had kept me from loving whites. How sweet God’s forgiveness and healing was?”   (Excerpted  from With Justice for All by John Perkins)

Prejudice is a terrible sin. It haunts the minds of many who would even seek to be holy. How does this disease work its way into a person's heart and mind? It uses the infectious method of deception and distortion. It warps the common sense of people by messing up their minds!

A deplorable incident occurred in the life of Mahatma Ghandi. He said in his autobiography that during his student days he was interested in the Bible. Deeply touched by reading the gospels, he seriously considered becoming a convert. Christianity seemed to offer the real solution to the caste system that was dividing the people of India.

One Sunday he went to a church to see the minister and ask for instruction on the way of salvation and other Christian doctrines. But when he entered the sanctuary, the ushers refused him a seat and suggested that he go and worship with his own people. He left and never went back. "If Christians have caste differences also," he said to himself, "I might as well remain a Hindu."

The Bible is very clear on what happens when one person in the Body of the Lord decides to discriminate against another. For example, Numbers: Chapter 12 shows us what happened to Miriam and Aaron when they criticize and discriminated against Moses' choice of an Ethiopian wife. Everyone should take some time and read through it again, especially if you haven't done so lately!

Loving others is the key to being who Christ wants us to be. We are instructed to love others as we love ourselves. We are to treat all people the same. We are to treat everyone equally. With dignity and respect! That is the way of God and the right way to live. Let’s practice Matthew 6:14-15. And may people around you know you are a Christian by your love.

"Love is not blind--it sees more, not less. But because it sees more, it is willing to see less."   -Rabbi Julius Gordon

Scripture: Psalm 63:3; Psalm 57:10; Proverbs 21:21; 1 Corinthians 16:14; Ephesians 4:2; 1 Peter 4:8; 2 Thessalonians 3:5; 1 John 4:18; Galatians 3:28; Matthew 7:1; Genesis 1:26-27

Prayer: Heavenly Father, we ask for thy guidance and save us from violence, discord, and confusion; from pride and arrogance; and from every evil way. Drive from among us all bitterness and racial prejudice, fill our hearts with the spirit of brotherhood and make us a united people faithful to do Thy Will, through Christ Thy Son, Our Lord. Amen

God bless you all!

Heather